Record-breaking Deng has his sights set firmly on Tokyo glory

Joe Deng needed someone acting on a hunch to get to the Commonwealth Games in March on a discretionary pick. Then he came seventh in the final.

He was only 19.

Last week he broke the longest-standing Australian track record ever when he beat the 800-metre time set by Ralph Doebell when he won gold at the Mexico Olympics in 1968 and then matched by Alex Rowe four years ago.

Runners Peter Bol (left) and Joseph Deng.Credit:Luis Enrique Ascui

Deng is now 20 and coming in a hurry. He set out with coach Justin Rinaldi and training partner and close friend Peter Bol for one of them to break Doebell and Rowe’s time of one minute 44.4 seconds this year, before the record turned 50.

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“We had ‘Project 1:44’ going into Europe and I had been close to the record a few times – in Stockholm I ran 1:44.61 and two weeks before in Paris I ran 1:44.67 then we had three good weeks of training and I knew I was in shape and it was a matter of it being fast and I would get it,” Deng said.

“Going into Monaco the pace I was set to go through the first lap was 49.5 seconds and he [the pacemaker] ended up going through in 48.9 seconds and I was like one point something seconds behind –I went through in 50.7 seconds – and I started making a move.

“I knew it was fast and I just had to hold on, the last 200m I just kicked and I felt pretty good and I looked at the time with 20 metres to go and when it came up on the board 1:44.21 I was so stoked.”

He finished seventh in that Diamond League race in Monaco, Bol was right behind him.

This year since Deng moved to Melbourne to join Rinaldi and Bol, he and Bol are two wins each in the four races they have had head to head. It is a healthy rivalry.

“Joseph moved from Queensland. Now we will have a full season together, same manager, James Templeton, same coach and that is a big difference, not just having someone at the level to train with but how much fun we have with it, we are so relaxed,” Bol said.

The pair are connected by their coach but also by a shared background. Bol was born in Sudan before fleeing to Egypt and then arriving in Australia as a boy. Deng was born in a refugee camp in Kenya after his mum also fled Sudan. He arrived in Queensland as a six-year-old.

“What is scary is there could be so many more, there is so much more talent in the Sudanese community, there is a lot coming through in AFL football. It takes Aliir Aliir and Majak [Daw] playing at the top and people follow,” Bol said.

This week marked two years to the Tokyo Olympics. It is a goal both have keenly in focus.

Next year they will go to the world indoors and later in the year the world championships in Doha. Beyond that Tokyo awaits.

“I want to make the finals at the world championships and Olympics. Once you are in the final who knows?’ Deng said.

Breaking the record and racing in Europe this year was the moment Deng felt he shifted from boy to serious world-scale runner.

“I raced [world record-holder] David Rudisha in Budapest last year, it was awesome. It was my first proper time on the European circuit, I was still a little boy racing the big boys. It was awesome,” Deng said.

“I got the record in Monaco, if we didn’t run I would never get to go there.Hopefully I go back there next year.

Michael Gleeson is a senior AFL football writer and Fairfax Media's athletics writer. He also covers tennis, cricket and other sports. He won the AFL Players Association Grant Hattam Trophy for excellence in journalism for the second time in 2014 and was a finalist in the 2014 Quill Awards for best sports feature writer. He was also a finalist in the 2014 Australian Sports Commission awards for his work on ‘Boots for Kids’. He is a winner of the AFL Media Association award for best news reporter and a two-time winner of Cricket Victoria’s cricket writer of the year award. Michael has covered multiple Olympics, Commonwealth Games and world championships and 15 seasons of AFL, He has also written seven books - five sports books and two true crime books.